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Monthly Archives: November 2014

Remembrance of Transgender IndividualsTaken by Murder or through Taking their own life.Act of Remembrance
Soon after the World mourns the loss of all who fell in the War between 1914 and 1918 as well as the fallen from all other Wars since, it is an other solemn day to reflect on with the 20 November Transgender Day of Remembrance.
During the Wars which disguise themselves by being hatred between Nations, there is another human context which seldom is considered but is responsible for the violation and murder of many fellow citizens and that is purely on the basis of their sexuality.
It was in times of War all differences were sought out and primarily it was homosexuals and the transgender population who were singled out after the Jewish people and other ethnically diverse people to kill.
They suffered just as abysmally as any Jewish person and we’re gathered up and included in mass genocide. Many countries can testify to the many thousands of their citizens who were taken and killed purely on the basis of their sexuality.Now in 2014The losses continue without War.
Every year more savage attacks and deaths are occurring through the basic ignorance and uncontrolled behavior of violent people.
They act alone and also together showing the worst prejudice of all,
the prejudice that cannot tolerate another human being who is different to them and shows their own hate to be their inadequacy and being unaccepting of difference.Continuing Hidden
There is no doubt this continuing death toll is hidden and not discussed in the communities it happens in. Some of those countries where it is a crime to be Homosexual have even less tolerance for Transgender individuals.
The whole continent of Africa is in a dangerous conflict with itself.
With the fragility of each nation coming out of War and Oppression, of
dealing with continued exploitation and corruption or entering into further conflict and displacement the continent has many problems to deal with.Africa at odds with Africa
The oppression and exploitation of Women continues to set back the future of Africa by Centuries. The aids epidemic and sexual history of Africa is a fundamental indicator of the fractured future progress of democratic freedom and Human Rights advances.

As part of the reasoning Nations offer within Africa offer for their state measure of control they resort to violence and prison when confronted with someone whose sexuality does not meet with their approval.
Far less than understanding the law given to us by The Lord to ‘Love thy Neighbour’ the persons who cannot understand basic Human Rights and fail to see the promise which providing Equality of Human Rights would have on them individually and collectively, go down the route of their forefathers and reject learning which God put us on this world to do.
We are here to learn Gods ways and accept the natural order of things and alleviate pain and suffering wherever it is found. We then should share it with others.
In Africa there is an inherent Law of justice written in everyone’s heart which is either suppressed or exploited. To exploit that Law everyone must respect their own family and then their neighbours family.
The breakdown of family in Africa is foremost a basic lack of resources to meet the modern world and it’s challenges. This breakdown is a legacy of colonial states and the imitation of Western corruption severely slowing down any advances with exploitation by the likes of China and American Universities believe it or not massive obstacles to self determination.
Some youth in Africa believe the modern worlds greatest inventions are weapons of Individual and mass destruction.
Weaponry is the least constructive thing at hand. It cannot create crops or medicine nor can weapons overthrow an enemy. The ‘enemy’ being fought is in the perpetrator themselves. The menace eats away at the perpetrator until they can themselves no longer bargain with their own demons.
They spread their disease quickly to others and hatred defines them despite the calls of acting for a higher authority.

Like the girl looking into the well The Lord is within us and it is without question the most compelling thing mankind can rely on.
You only have to recognize your own instincts for goodness that overwhelm any darkness that might arise and know the greater is willed by God in you.
Where else would it come from?

NI Human Rights Festival events include ‘The Plight of Congoleses Women’
at Crescent Arts Centre Belfast on 12 Dec 2014 a free event from 5.30 to 7.30pm being organized by Mimi Unamoyo (Empowering BME Women) and NICRAS see http://www.humanrightsfestivalni.com and info@humanrightsfestivalni.org Facebook is /nihrf twitter is @NIHRF or #
This also coincides with the worldpressphoto2014 visiting Belfast in which New Zealander Robin Hammond gave a talk on his campaigns in Africa putting on record the maltreatment of LGBT and Mental Health people with some very harrowing and starkly direct images of these areas and issues as found. If further information is of interest see http://www.robinhammond.co.uk and the other World Press Photo 2014 site http://www.worldpressphoto.org.uk
Which freely upload images for your own personal use.
Any images there can of course be obtained directly from the PhotogrPher credited. The use in conjunction with raising awareness is distinctly an advantage given the directness and the professionalism of the Photographers going to see for themselves and recording it.
The mental Health Image above is from Robin Hammonds collection.

I have included at the foot of this blog a direct lift of text from http://www.stoprapeinconflict.org/dr_congo
This relates directly to the horrific abuse and sometimes death in conflict and in transit sometimes under the noses of the NGOs.Europe in the Frame
Even in European countries it is treated as a hidden thing and through it being an indictment against any country seeing itself as forward thinking and a democracy, it is a taint on that countries psyche.

The intolerance is of course as all intolerances due to ignorance.

A basic lack of understanding is at the heart of most all fears and prejudices. They are formed in our heads and the teachings of the communities in which these acts occur are to blame for their contiuance.

Change must happen now and change can happen now.

TRANS RESPECT VERSUS TRANS PHOBIA
WORLDWIDE
THIS IS THE TITLE GIVEN TO THE NETWORK GROUP GLOBALLY
FOR A MORE TRANSPARENT AND INFORMED VIEW OF THE HUGE DIFFICULTIES AND PREJUDICES FACED ALL AROUND THE WORLD

Proof
The feelings for mankind are at the heart of this intolerance as are most gaps in our basic knowledge. Feelings of hatred eminate from the same biology of all of us, only in some it is a malfunction they cannot or will not recognise.

Even as medical advances are made to remove peoples suffering through sophisticated reading of medicines and human physiology there is a primitive lack in the human mind which needs radically confronted through the neurological examinations which conflict with our very existence.

There is no preordained instruction to eradicate anyone of difference.
Instead their is a preordained instruction to love thy neighbour.

Transgender identity struggles with the many consideration within its community to try to find ways of communicating and Transgender Day of Remembrance is one significant bridge.
This is a Human Rights blog devoted to Human Rights.
There is also a subsaharan African Website with many contacts and directions on the issues directly.http://www.derechos.org/human-rights/afr/
There needs to be a bridge. It was at a service held to commemorate the losses of this and past years I was privileged to hear Francis Sheils speak for many thousands, hundreds of thousands of Transgender and LGBT community people who are continually facing prejudice simply on the basis of their sexuality.

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Here is the address on Sunday 16 November 2014 in Belfast by Francis Sheils.

Transgender Day of Remembrance 20/11/2014

In preparing what I was going to say today, I was reminded of a performance event I attended, delivered by an American Quaker friend of mine Peterson Toscano, who besides being a writer and performer is a noted biblical scholar, he also happens to be gay and was researching the Bible for evidence of a loving God who had created him and accepted him in his imperfection.

During this research he continually came across individuals who were not expressing the gender roles typical of their sex and expected at that time in their culture.
He gradually recognised that these individuals were transgressing and transcending the typical gender roles of their times.
One of the characters he examines is Joseph, the 2nd youngest son of Jacob, whose sons went on to found 10 of the 12 tribes of Israel.

Joseph is very different from his brothers, he is described in the text as troubled and having regular dreams. He is his father’s favourite son and he is given a garment by his dad a tetromathazine (please forgive my Hebrew), there is definitive description of the garment , nor meaning for the word tetromathazine.
This is the only place in Genesis where the word appears.
Anyway, one day Joseph is sent out by his father to deliver a message to his brothers, I think they were tending the sheep, and on seeing him the brothers set upon him and gave him a severe beating and tore the garments from him, covered it in his blood and sell him into slavery in Egypt.

Years pass and a famine comes, the crops fail and the brothers go to Egypt to get grain.
They meet Joseph, who by this stage is 2nd in command in Egypt and they don’t recognise him because of all the makeup, finery and jewellery.

What does Joseph do? He doesn’t exact vengeance which would have been the expected act of a Jewish male, an eye for an eye a tooth for a tooth.
No he acts like the mother hen and protects and feeds his family as only a mother hen would do.

Peterson researched and researched and finally came across the word tetromathazine in one other place, 2nd Samuel where it is used when King David gives his daughter Tamar the garment before she is defiled by her half brother.
It is very clear from this particular passage that the garment is a princess dress given to a virgin daughter on the eve of her wedding.

It is not hard to imagine the same violence being visited on Transgender women today, particularly women of colour, where they are beaten black and blue, their bodies defiled and their clothes destroyed in acts of fury.

I challenge anyone hearing that story not to think of TDoR in future when they hear any of the Lloyd Webber songs from ‘Joseph and his Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat’.

Transgender Day of Remembrance is marked each year on the 20th November.
It is the most solemn day of the Transgender calendar.
The day was first marked in the USA in November 1999 to remember those Transgender individuals killed due to prejudice or hatred.

The day raises awareness of hate violence against Transgender individuals, provides a space for public mourning and honours the lives of Transgender individuals who otherwise might be forgotten.
The day was founded in response to the transphobic murder of Rita Heesters on 28/11/1998.

The day is now marked world-wide and in 2013 was formally marked in over 180 cities in 30 countries in Africa, Asia, Europe, North America and Oceania.

Between 1st October 2013 and 30th September 2014 there were 226 known victims of transphobic murder , not to mention the countless Transgender individuals who took their own lives by suicide that we don’t know of, rather than face the world as their true selves.
Research from a number of studies show that 40% of Transgender individuals attempt suicide at least once before seeking treatment for their Gender Dysphoria (the medical term for Transsexualism – the medical term for the condition that affects us).

Unfortunately for the first time since we began organising this service, we are aware of one young Transgender woman JORDAN HOWE who completed suicide in Northern Ireland earlier this year.

Her friend Capri will be reminding us later of this unique individual whose life was cut too short before she got the chance to let us all see her individual God given talents.

With her family’s permission We are specially dedicating our service today to her memory and ask that you remember her family particularly , that they find solace and can come to terms with their very sad loss when we come to our act of remembrance.

For the past 5 years Transgender Day of Remembrance (TDoR) has been marked by events in Belfast on the actual day 20th November.

Last year for the 3rd time there was also a formal act of worship in All Souls Church in Belfast on the Sunday prior to the day.
We find ourselves gathered here again at the kind invitation of Rev. Chris and the Congregation of All Souls to remember our dead brothers and sisters, no longer with us just because of society’s attitudes towards us.

I want to take this opportunity to thank you all but particularly Linda Ballard for making such an effort to accept us into your midst and going out of your way to make us feel part of your community rather than apart from it.

I was at a service recently where the Minister told the story of an old man from Fermanagh who had to leave the family homestead that had been in the family from time immemorial and move into the town as he could no longer look after himself nor the “bastes”.

Anyway he takes his young granddaughter out to see the place and shows her round and he comes to the well that provided water for the family down through all the generations, they’re about to leave when the wee girl asks him, “ Granda, where does God Live?”
He lifts her up over the well and tells her to look down and asks her “What do you see?”
And he replies “ Well that’s where God lives , he lives in everyone of us”

As we move to the more solemn elements of our Remembrance Service today, Let us all remember that God lives in each one of us and in all of those Murdered Transgender individuals and those who have completed suicide.

That completes the address given by Francis Sheils.

The Service was a memorial in dedication of Jordan Howe.

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Innate Goodness
People have, I believe an innate sense of goodness which inhabits the same mind which has the latent urges of self or wider destruction.
This in Religious terms is accepting the flaws exist.

At the forefront of Nazism was a belief in the principle perfection which has
never had a rational nor any element of goodness.
Human nature carries us, not ultimate perfection. Hence our desire to express our community in societies of many shades, colours and unity.

The person who accepts the world for what it is can be truly accepting of all others. It was as Jesus asked of us to believe in the everlasting existence beyond our measure that has within us the ability to do no harm.

That is our simplest task and yet so many go against God and the natural law believing only they can define the world. They wish others to comply with their thoughts. God has not delivered anyone other than Jesus to speak to us. God in human form and we can take Gods wisdom to turn away from hatred and violence.

Nations have survived famine and climatic disaster with the main constituent being the assistance of other nations.

Under Gods law there is enough for all and their is a saying we are all equal under the Sun as we indisputably are under God.
No one can determine their time on earth.

• including Africa, Asia, Central and South America, Europe, North America and Oceania

• In Europe there have been 90 killings in 13 countries.

• FROM JANUARY 2008 TO SEPTEMBER 2014 THERE HAVE BEEN 6 RECORDED
TRANSPHOBIC MOTIVATED MURDERS IN THE UK.

TDOR UPDATE 2014

226 REPORTED CASES OF REPORTED KILLINGS OF TRANSGENDER INDIVIDUALS IN THE LAST 12 MONTHS IN

26 COUNTRIES

TDOR 2014 UPDATE

TMM REPORTS THE HIGHEST NUMBER OF REPORTED MURDERS OF MINORS SINCE THE PROJECT BEGAN.

HALF HAVE BEEN UNDER 20

TDOR UPDATE 2014
AMONG THE MINORS MURDERED WERE:

A 13 YEAR OLD TRANS GIRL FOUND STRANGLED IN THE CITY OF
MACUBA IN BRAZIL JUNE 9TH 2014

A 14 YEAR OLD TRANS GIRL FOUND STRANGLED IN THE CITY OF IBIPORA ,BRAZIL OCTOBER 15TH 2014

16 YEAR OLD “DWAYNE JONES” WHO WAS KICKED OUT OF HER HOME
AGED 14, AND ON JULY 22ND 2014 ATTENDED FOR THE FIRST TIME A
PARTY IN FEMALE CLOTHING IN ST. JAMES , JAMAICA , WHERE SHE WAS CHASED AND BRUTALLY MURDERED BY PARTY-GOERS, WHO FORMED A MOB, WHEN THEY REALISED SHE WAS A TRANSGENDER PERSON

————————————————————————————————————–Realisation
Help all who feel as Jordan Howe did find through talking to Professional Medical Advisors or through first step conversations with someone who is aware of the problems Transgender people face, find the strength to come to the conclusion they are equal to anyone they care to mention and have around them more who love them than would ever hate them.

In fact the people who are closest in your own society support you and continue to strive to make things better for everyone in their community and the world. You too are a part of that journey.
That is the vast majority of people’s standard reaction.
Because you cannot read it, or it is not apparent does not make it false.
The perception can be as damaging as the image it creates in your head.

A clear head may not be yours presently which is all the more reason to develop a conversation to get to the heart of your selfs journey.
There will be someone fully ware of the issues you are dealing with and can with a clear head guide you.
The fact is the ability to deal with issues that arise are becoming more clear to society and clarification of what is a complex part of ones identity is highly advanced given the right advice.

This in itself is not advice but a personal viewpoint which in itself seeks to guide you towards those with a very proven appreciation of Transgender identity and the advice is freely given.

A first point of call would be your own GP who should know specialist advisors and the service providers on Gender related issues.

The website mentioned above is primarily dealing with the issue of Public Information and Education.

There are other websites which will deal with the more direct issues of Transgender identity. The clear message is that there are very many aspects to the help and sharing concerns which can be addressed and dealt with by people whose experience far outweighs any individual. The raft of information is of itself something which can help greatly.

The fact is Trans respect versus Trans phobia is a means of creating Public awareness and is the paradigm, the model to communicate.
It has links to local groups and shares histories and a catalogue of very conscious experience on related Gender matters.

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For the memory of Jordan Howe TDoR 20 November 2014.

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The people who do not understand, simply do not understand.
It is up to society to adjust not the other way round.
Wherever you go in the world build bridges and take the message of inclusiveness with you. It is basically Gods Message.

Jesus sat down with all who he found to be vulnerable and ill at ease.
He assured them of the way of The Lord who would walk alongside and deliver them from all evil. It is Gods wish we talk amongst each other to know the way.

John Graham

20 November 2014

Belfast

Further events and Notices

SEXUAL ORIENTATION AWARENESS TRAINING

DATE
09/12/2014
TIME
12:00 pm – 2:00 pm
LOCATION
HERE NI, Belfast
PRICE
Free
CATEGORIES
Talks
EVENT DESCRIPTION
This training organised by HERE NI will give participants a chance to talk openly about sexual orientation, it will run through some of the effects of homophobia on LGBTQ people and will give participants valuable information on language, changing attitudes and how to be more inclusive.
To register for this event contact: cara.mccann@hereni.org by Friday 5th December.

TRANSGENDER RIGHTS ARE HUMAN RIGHTS

DATE
09/12/2014
TIME
4:00 pm – 6:30 pm
LOCATION
Long Gallery, Parliament Buildings Stormont, Belfast
PRICE
Free
CATEGORIES
Talks
EVENT DESCRIPTION
This transgender Human Rights mini conference presented by Focus: The Identity Trust will examine gender recog­nition legislation in the UK and the Republic of Ireland and will also examine all areas of the lives of transgender and intersex individuals where they experience difficulty in accessing and enjoying the same basic human rights as the rest of society. Meave Mc Laughlin MLA Chair of the Health committee and Focus Identity Trust are delighted to welcome keynote speakers Lord Carlile and Aengus O’Snodaigh TD, who both proposed the first ever gender recognition bills in their own jurisdiction.
To register for this event contact: info@thefocustrust.com

There are many many more events on so check out the website to see what you can engage with.

Despite the war formally ending with a peace agreement almost a decade ago, the Democratic Republic of Congo continues to be embroiled in a violent and deadly conflict. Having claimed at least 5.4 million lives since the outbreak of war in 1998, the country has also received the unwelcome distinction as the rape capital of the world.

Its strategic importance, as well as bountiful natural resources—raw minerals, land, and fresh water—are a longstanding source of tension within the Congo. The 1994 Rwandan Genocide, which brought an influx of 1.5 million people over the border into North and South Kivu, exacerbated preexisting hostilities in the area. Disputes over citizenship and land ownership only compounded ethnic rivalries and weak governance structures.

“We are always send by our chiefs who tells us “Do this!” Despite your refusal they oblige you to do it; otherwise you will be beaten seriously. As a result, you will do it unwittingly. And you can even rape because of that.” Rape in War: Motives of Militia in DRC, United States Institute of Peace, 2010

Aging Congolese dictator Mobutu Sese Seko had been aggravating inequality among the population, throwing the country into a steep economic decline over time. An uprising born in the eastern provinces, supported by Rwanda and Uganda, seized the fragile moment and moved rapidly on the capital. Yet, new President Laurent Kabila soon gained the wrath of his foreign allies, embroiling the entire region into a continental war in 1998.

While a peace agreement in 2002 was to end to the fighting, violence still characterizes daily life. Especially in North and South Kivu provinces, Congolese rebels and foreign groups remain active and significant military operations by the state have been launched in recent years. In northeastern Province Orientale, there has been renewed fighting with the incursion of the Lord’s Resistance Army.

More than 400,000 women ages 15 to 49 experienced rape between 2006 and 2007 in the Democratic Republic of Congo. That is equivalent to 1,152 women raped every day, 48 women raped every hour, or four women raped every five minutes. If Numbers Could Scream: Estimates and Determinants of Sexual Violence in the Republic of the Congo, American Public Health Association, 2011

Efforts were made to demobilize and integrate fighters into a new Congolese force or reintegrate them into communities, yet the project has faced a massive challenge. Continuing violence provides an incentive to return to old allegiances, with numerous desertions from the army and program. The attraction of mineral wealth has posed an additional challenge and provided extra income to rebel groups, armed gangs, and major political players alike—further aggravating institutional disorder which provides ideal circumstances for committing widespread human rights violations without punishment.

Rape and gender violence in The Democratic Republic of Congo has been marked by extreme brutality including rape, gang rape, genital mutilation, sexual slavery, and insertion of objects into cavities.

“You know, [rape] is also because of the suffering from being hungry, not having anything, living like animals [tozovivre lokola banyama] … Even the dogs here eat better than us! We were hungry yesterday, today hungry and tomorrow hungry [nzala lobi, nzala lelo, nzala lisusu lobi]. Also when we get it, you should see it: look at this! [pointing to plate with dark fufu on the ground]. When we get something this is what we get. Not even the pigs would eat it. Also, is this food for soldiers in combat who have to walk long distances and carry heavy weapons? It also makes people angry and anger makes you want to do bad stuff. Rape is also part of that. But it is not good.” The Complexity of Violence: a critical analysis of sexual violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Nordic Africa Institute, 2010

As the conflict is fought within communities, violence occurs mostly in homes, villages, and in the fields where people work. Communities are often targeted for conspiring with the enemy or are looted after a skirmish. The Congolese security forces have also been known to loot (and commit acts of sexual violence on the civilian population) due to unpaid salaries or during mutinies against officers. All sides in the conflict have committed systematic rape and gender violence including the foreign-backed groups, local rebels, community-based militia—the Mai Mai, as well as the Congolese state forces.

Reasons for rape by armed men, whether belonging to the government army, rebel group or foreign-backed group, are varied. These include systematic humiliation to counter men’s growing frustration at deteriorating status in society, to breed insecurity and fear in communities, and Mai Mai members have additionally stated that rape provides “magical powers” before combat.

The incidence of rape remains highest in areas where military operations take place, yet there has been a sharp rise in gender violence throughout the whole of the country. The severe gender imbalance, with prevailing impunity, has allowed for a society where rape is acceptable and unpunished. Domestic violence, rape by former troops living within communities, and by men in positions of power—including police officers—is common. Survivors still lack comprehensive support, and are often too ashamed and fearful to come forward.

“The majority of women were attacked in their own homes and most attacks happened during the evenings and nights. This pattern is in contrast to that found in other recent conflicts in Africa, where rape is reported primarily when women go out in search of water or firewood, when they are farming their fields or when their village is attacked.” Now the World is Without Me: An Investigation of Sexual Violence in Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, Harvard Humanitarian Initiative & Oxfam, 2010

Data to document the prevalence of male rape is being gathered, yet male survivors are still often silent, with little access to medical or psychosocial support. Testimonies point to an increase of systematic male rape with military operations in 2009—the last push by Congo to remove foreign forces from the Kivu region.

Impunity reigns within the Democratic Republic of Congo, and despite the government’s acknowledgement that its own security forces constitute one of the main groups of perpetrators, comprehensive reforms to the security sector have not been enacted. Known perpetrators of mass human rights violations remain within the army and major hurdles remain to provide the Congolese with a security force that is a protector rather than an instigator of gender violence.

Best Wishes and Thank you for getting to the bottom of my blog completed this Transgender Day of Remembrance 2014.

Miscalculations beyond Mathematics
The Manchester of 1951 is an unlikely starting point for this Film’s tale of wartime miraculous secrecy and labourious detective work led by the deducing skills of the misfit, the duxes, the venerable seer of Sherlock, Benedict Cumberbatch who is mercurially adept at giving his all as the private detective his alter ego is.
If proof were needed BC plays the role of Alan Turing with accomplished anti-heroic finesse ably assisted by KK of whom more later.
Solutions are hard to come by in wartime and this film begins with the problematic fact of a break-1in at his Manchester home. The story is beginning at the playing out of the end episode of his truly claustrophobic life.
This tale is veristic and shows the ugly contemptible side of Sovereign life willing us to War, with its raw vindictive hurtful ruling class, power and authority pressing forward into War.
The Sovereignty again the despising foe after the War seems to be hung on the deplorable inhumane treatment of same sex relationships, with hypocrisy it seeks to obliterate vice or any foreseen sin.
The timescale of a film is such that to deliver the goods, and this film undoubtedly does, it is ambitious, framing it over three time periods.
The early school period, the post war period and the whole central arena of code breaking and the hazards, mostly human obstacles that are put in his way. The periods intersect and occur as script messengers. There is with the early period a film within a film about he young Alan Turing. A brilliant evocation of child sanctuary. It maybe a momentary relief and escape for us from the despair of the War beginning to overwhelm those in the line of fire. Certainly the expression of Alan’s earlier years are very incisive with the caveat the character traits are over elaborated.History Recalls
When the Labour Party came to power after the war, it was after many had signed up within the army itself; a whole movement of the British Labour movement was sweeping into place.Denis Healey a Major, etc. mobilised a Socialist backlash in and after the War which Winston Churchill had not foreseen.
The man born in Blenheim was as good a wingman for the ruling classes and the Monarchy as could be imagined. The Blenheim thing is a remarkable history of working in concert with Sovereignty. He had the brains to make war winnable.
Oddly the film only makes a few references to the colossus (the official name of the AT machine also) Winston Churchill was in the very actions of Bletchley Park. The American influence he brought also lacking along with the actual USA connections.
The instrument of the fight back, of which he and the American forces could direct, in the knowledge certain things were foretold to them by Alan Turings breakthrough and was a basis of winning the War and ending it soonest. Hitler had overrun twenty four nations at least before Alan Turing came to Bletchley.
The absence of Churchill was an avoidance perhaps of the ruthless nature of his perceived wisdom and of his overseers and alliance to the Monarchy whose very existence was at the centre of the onslaught Hitler had framed. Churchill is incredibly difficult to read and that is because he was a polymath who through his life extolled the abolition of the House of Lords as it failed to represent thee ole and he foresaw the bitterness of the Irish being unable to design their own future as well as becoming in later life ‘devoted’ to Sufism as a way of dealing what had occurred.
It is also closely associated with mindfulness and the good grace to reflect and move on.
The Second World War was a completely savage animal.
It destroyed its children and ate the remains of souls and through the higher atonement of hopeless narratives of the likes of C.S.Lewis produced ‘Godless’ given lies to comfort the deranged, billeted, shock burnt, hovel dwelling, barrack bound dutiful meat of war as plenty.
The painful narrative was never exhumed.Cause and Intent
Somewhere the common cause was unified. The aims of Monarchy, the Spirit of Freedom in the people.
Within the War were to be found the extremities of human brutality and from whatever standpoint, it began as a assault against a ferociously violent and destructive force it revealed more than humanity could have imagined.
The confusion of the aims of des Fuhrer and the hidden atrocities as concentration camps that reconnaissance must have identified were unknown by and large to the British Public yet they fought knowing the reality of the menace was no less than their loss of liberty.
Also unknown to the military and public were the levels of ‘higher’ intelligence and the technological background war which in the field basic radio phones and radar instruments much less penetratable.
The film highlights the duality of positions and their intractable evaluation in the moment. It can be no different now.Counterfeit of Counterfactual Thoughts
Into this fog of War The Imitation Game looms large as the analog and cerebal force which took on the enemy and its cause of domination what ever it would conceivably become.
The arms in this case; the empowerment of the mechanisms of the fight, came in the form of manpower and brainpower.
Code-breakers are needed in all guises and the oddity that Benedict plays with elegant restraint and masterly eccentricity, is summoned to Bletchley to join a team being assembled to face the challenge set by the Naval Campaign being fought by the Germans in the seas off England. The food supplies to England from American where hitting the bottom of the sea.And you are?
Occupying the interviewee seat in the empty office of Commander Alex. Dennison (Charles Dance) whose task it is to run the show and achieve results AT is harangued on his aptitude and self warranted and illustrious reputation and it wil come as no surprise that he is given a position on the team, of about five. Another component is present at the following team meeting in the grand setting of one of Bletchley House magnificent dining rooms. This is the relay officer back to Government. It is Mark Strong as the implement of MI6. His role is a greater characterisation which is complemented, the only complimentary mind to AT other than his own hireling KK. His playing is a constant. The acerbic and moderately ridiculous Commander is not played with the same astute learned reading as that of Mark Strong. The team who are like different faces of a dice and Alan Turing is the joker, the icicle supreme thinker whose tolerance; it works both ways, of these fellow skilled code breakers is something in which events construct connections are – Hugh Alexander (Matthew Goode), John Cairncross ( Allen Leech) and supposed Peter Hilton (Matthew Beard) with the director barely noticing this mathematician.
Formidable jobs and the need to get along exceptionally well is harvested through the initial contests for recognition. Others needed to express their own skills while Turing began the process he had created in his head. Hugh Alexander is a handsome Lothario who has it seems studied the essentials in the battle royale between the sexes by means of being a superior reader of flirtation which is the prologue to the fun times he relies on. It is well played and is another central character to provide dynamic and the contrapuntal story brought along efficiently but with a little clichéd hero and anti hero of the sort found in ‘Hotspur’ or ‘Boys Own’ ‘Eagle’ (and yes young ones there were little hero comics around even during wartime and they were full of manly types as the welsh might say) and the aim in the film which it achieves is to fulfill a history with little room for fault.Alan Turing is much quieter and considered in his appreciation of the importance of the work but that is due to his higher confidence in breaking the code through a method he has constructed through long calculations which culminate in his own ‘Enigma’ machine. The others mainly do appreciate the task but are full of doubt.Totnes got there earlier
Down in a room in Totnes, Somerset, there is a machine I once saw which in itself was staggering to encounter. The reason for going into the small establishment was mere curiousity. The Turing machine was an analog computer which relied on processing voltages and we see in the 1951 era the machine in his Manchester House which he continues to develop as a programmable device it comes in at about half the size.
What I saw was Charles Babbage’s extrordinary adding machine or difference calculus which was the precursor of the ‘analog’ and the pressure computer.
It not only looked beautiful, it was full of symmetry and appeared as a vision, as divining musical instrument. It was so long ago one fixed memory that remains with me is the winding spiral stair at one side which had as a handrail a very thick bound rope and you would ascend the stair to look down into the innards of this machine holding this fibre handrail which itself evoked a sense of ‘difference’. It was hard not to take in this truly groundbreaking technology.
It was built before 1871. Mr Babbage lived to the age of 79.
Encryption German style was their Enigma enciphering machine created for commercial use in the early 1920s and modified later and put into commission by the German and allies for military use in World War II.Early Turing
His early childhood appears in segments throughout and we slide back down to the four foot tall Alan (Alex Lawther) whose handling of the part is very very impressive Jack Bannon) with whom he finds a kinship is equally strong.
It is here in the public school environment Alan Turing discovers so early in his life the difference he is among his fellow strand of humanity.
Christopher reads the mind of Alan fairly astutely and encouragingly he introduces him to what will be contained in his life, code breaking.
This element is as good and as important a composite in the telling of the life of Turing as the main body of the film. It is handled very well and while no part of the film explores his homosexuality and only makes a guess at what the need for a friend like Christopher indicated.
One portion of his hireling, found with a typically left field exercise is the cellular composition that resides inside the beautifully formed head of KK.
He doesn’t bat an eyelid or twitch his toes uncontrollably when KieraKnightly comes on the scene. She comes with a crossword solving mind which impresses, besides her starry eyes and profound beauty is a woman with common ethics and standards. The machine invented by Turing has her, Joan Clarke as a formidable component in the jigsaw that breaks the code. How the machine Alan Turing has constructed finds a way to operate. Its operating system is given its own language by a whole permutation of all the minds in the Bletchley Park compound.
The figurative language of humans is the remarkable component of our relation to this story and the eventualities which we are still, after so many years, having to be courageous in facing further understanding of the history which has us where we are. The past is still concealed despite its having happened.
Bletchley had many serried ranks of women intercepting, noting every morse code message and the period detail of the film is illuminating.Moments
The scenes between Cumberbatch and Knightly are the finest in the film and they have no shock value and play up the more than spiritual bond and it is akin to – without creating a quantum leap hopefully – their common knowledge; they are a pair of the most prodigious minds in the country, is summoning Plato whose ideas of impermanent physical objects (Alan and Joan) representing preformed unchanging ideas which are out with reach. Their shared knowledge of this is not uniform as Joan has set of relationship histories she can rely on. The peril is the fact there is no such element within AlanTuring which makes his fault lines obvious to him and unbridgeable. It is during this performance by Benedict Cumberbatch the evidence is sublimely advanced for a more relative and accurate assessment of a hidden life as far as that may exhume the demons and be of greater importance and value.
It is possible people may not be aware of this unconventional life and the Egham, Surrey (nr. Runnymede who always try to claim it) preserve of British high intelligence and it is still an unpardonable travesty of a persons humanity that his sexuality was to be the source of his destruction.
In a society in which he invented a means to bring closer the end of the monsters trail of barbarity, he was treated as a leper.
The knives were out and it is a vengefulness which has a very strange element even with the complexities of the times.The Imitation Game gives no further insights but fleshes out the history in a clever and well formed way without venturing onto the landscape of Alan Turings struggles and his own perception of his sexuality and his desires for close relationships.
The strange things are never really uncovered and it is a rare case when they are.
The more compelling and important part, even underscored here; despite the initial simulated bombing footage mixed into war footage, and though it had a tragic end, is that Alan Turing saved countless lives and put down a blueprint for rational and considered judgement against the real prospect of another Attila crossing the globe and destroying the lives of nations living in peace. His politics are agnostic it seems.Screen Portrayal
The script is constructed in a time honored methodical adherence to type which seldom fails to loose you. The complex workings of Alan Turings gayness only is a recitation in overdub and never shows him in contact with anyone of the same sex – in keeping with the sullen, theatrical – it sometimes appears as if it is a play – protective pithy way some English film mainstream narratives attempt at filling too many boxes.

It ashamedly is marketed on the fall off of this past weeks commemorative events which cast back to the First World War and gets plenty of demerits on that alone as it is not of any further insight as far as the 100 year gap is concerned. That may be pushing cynicism to an extreme but could it not have appeared sooner and not in direct relation?

It is a film for which several accolades are due and hopefully a gong or two get to firstly, Benedict Cumberbatch, secondly, Kiera Knightly, and thirdly possibly something to be found for Mark Strong who balancing of the players at times makes this a very accomplished treatment.
Morten Tyldum. Honest this was the biggest available photo at the time!
Conclusion #### 4
Excellent polished film but not many surprises. Superb cast and excellent period Cinematography.
For a time when we are constantly reminded of War past and ongoing there is something of conscious restraint and painful regret that this film does not hit as hard say as The Dambusters or even Oh what a Lovely War and many other stories of War. The reason is it is set in the machinations of strategy and preparation.
The English backdrop is one of intrigue and intelligence coupled with fear and foreboding. The War is barely imagined within the film, except through simulated footage and World at War reels during it, and in the Maps sometimes referred to and an excerpt inside London. Time allows more.
This off theatre of War is able to direct us to the aims and conditions for War. The terrible actions of weaponry is seen on a large scale and the machine against machine is in counterbalance with the intelligence trail led by the likes of Alan Turing whose part in deciphering through his own genius the Enigma Coding frame is put into brilliant focus.
The talents of Benedict Cumberbatch and Kiera Knightly show in deciphering their characters with cleverness and adducent period authority enough hopefully for a few gongs. Is there a hesitancy in not treating Alan Turing’s sexuality more forthrightly a play towards larger audiences say in America? Is that really part of the deal with films of a very important central subject? Some scenes could have been dropped without loosing a great deal I would venture

Well worth the effort of going to see. It will undoubtedly pick up a few wards but which ones is down to the subjective minds of the judges.

At QFT Belfast from Friday 14 November to Thursday 27 November 2014

Magna est veritas, et praevalebit

Truth is great and will prevail.

Tourism Information.
Bletchley Park is open to visitors and is just past Runnymede.
On the South Bank of the Thames West of London.
The people of Runnymede can soon be found celebrating the granting of the Magna Carta 800 years ago in 1215 by King John.
It was only after the people coerced him of course! and though we still are under the illusion the rights of man are known these were thought at the time the basis of any fundamental constitution or law guaranteeing rights and liberties.
Wallingford is further down the Thames near Reading and gets is name from the route ‘forded’ by William the Conqueror (Duke of Normandy) in 1066, (not to be confused with Wilhelm 1) choosing to go north past London.
That way he survived and so the song goes ‘From a Duke to King!.’
Is it near the ‘Ford Escort’ factory in Reading I wonder?
Or did they make the Capri there? I’ll have to Google it.

Totnes is nowhere near the above and it is unlikely to be the source of the Thames either! More Googling but the Babbage Computer is a phenomenal object and it is pre-industrial revolution whatever that may signify!

100 years Never forget the Sacrifices
Never forget the only Sacrifice which
will save us from this senseless cycle
of needless wanton destruction of
human life in all its forms.
Forgive the stranger and destroy
the sin within the sinner.
The Saviour will be alongside
Neither above nor below.
A poem of reflection for all losses.

The Great Lie

Alderwood station, the train has stopped,
Quietness, stillness on a line, the platform’s edge.
Looking out the the open window, strap down, countryside
Other view, murmurations of starlings over the station roof,
city side flock across the skies, faint birdsong, in cover,
heard in the woods, earth smells drift, horses chomp the grass
Susan returns, “Two coffins are being unloaded”
Their heaviness a trolley bears, where once their feet would pace
along this platform, to Lord’s to see the batting of W.G.Grace
Now the shaft of light, serrated edge of canopy, cutting angular
across the beaded village nameplate, no longer summoning
now ending, their journeys decree no longer ineluctable fate.
Family flesh, blood circulating like warm tea replenishing.
Dinner would not be taken, shared conversations uncast.
Instead the sun heats the Church stone, the glass reflects intact,
The gravedigger has marked the plots, friends not brothers,
Sharing their dreadful waste, heads still, eyelids forever shut,
Ceaseless, senseless bloody war has us on this spot
Their lives like classroom history shared, had shared,
Fresh books in decades depict this age, this loss so great,
Each a witness to the others courage at war and on the pitch.
The dead have done, a much as they can do,
the dead are gone, soul adrift, none equal in this rest,
Sons and daughters betrayed by guns and low treachery,
The train driver lifts the safety catch, departure,
Our lives they trundle on.

John Graham
November 9 2014

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The Disquisition.
For an idea to take shape it requires some exploration.
It happens as I was an attendee at a rare Sunday Evening Service at the Church I go to; it last had evening services a very long time ago, it shall remain nameless as in the following you will see convergence and assimilation is what matters.

The service was, as is often the case, the means to accessing and discussing these things.
I related to a reflection from a book I had just finished in which it had me considering the larger questions. Then came bigger questions once I began writing and coincidences started to occur.

Something New?
From the heading to this opening section I have added a question mark.
Having read in a book of a reference made by the author concerning ‘Something New‘ I came to realise in the phrase something’s , that came in the later stages of the ‘The Pillow Book of Eleanor Bron’ a hidden detail. She has it seems accumulated, been holding back!, some of the more confounding things for this part of her book, like an actor having taken you through the immensely satisfying passages of the play – the pillow book has opened and insights that have not escaped her, she brings momentous challenges of thought as the heart of the ‘play’ in its denouement.

This observation by EB is the final act, but you are conscious it is only one book in her life and so much more is not revealed.
She is not going to spill the beans about the important stuff; namely her character assessment within herself and her opinions, true opinions on things past and present. No, only the bigger picture anecdotal entitlements we are able to access now we have them here written in this casual form!Pillowbooks
Pillowbooks are essays on any subject that occurs to you in the course of writing. The object is to arrange the thoughts into common themes and to loosely take things chronologically give a rhythm of structure. The practice is ancient.

Something new? Well, when she has been rehearsing and improvising,as the American acting style of learning developed into, she notices something which illustrates much more than just acting.

In the manner of the writing of a Pillowbook a short title is used.
It comes in these last passages as ‘startling things‘ neither with capitals or bold but italisised.
em>startling things‘….another actor who takes a piece of text or of behaviour and opens doors and lets in light that makes everyone, hilarious, with that delight that comes almost always not from finding out something new, but a shock of recognition of being emended of something so obvious that you know it, somewhere, all the time. If you can offer something back, and something back, and yet again, and on and on – wonderful.’Other Meanings
From this you can take much besides the simple recognition Eleanor Bron is making as a ‘startling thing’ ‘something’ which climbs to a higher place. She leaves it at that while being exhilarated by the insight.
She has taken it, as it means so much more. It is reason for acting and portraying ideas before people as a kind of witness giving energy to every thing it touches.
To act out the intention and meanings of mere words is a glorious concept which assists our understanding of many things. The continual – see the repetition in the last sentence of her piece – is what she describes in leading up to this recognition as exhilarating.Time
More can be gathered by looking into this thought deeply and in the context of mere religion and the universal.
Not being something new shows the existence, the prior truth as being the only something that matters. The truth inherent is that all already exists and it is finite not to be added to.
Therein is everything that ever will be in the future already here.
It is simply not yet fully uncovered.
The saying nothing is new under the Sun is only partially accurate.
The universe which we look back upon, through the achievements of science, is of past times.

The modifications we make through uncovering things and destroying things is a cycle within the existing time that is still. It is a stationary timeless essence of our existence. No time exists. Time being a concept.
The passage I refer to has in it the essence of this thought.
That all is in existence and as some prefer to reason, ‘ye must be born again’ that seems to mean return within.
There is no conflict in this saying as it contains the other thought or truth that is often referred to ‘nothing can be created nor destroyed‘
So in the saying, it unveils some truth as it was otherwise intended.
The Big Bang theory is complete. The theory is that the creation of – and the creator is the universe itself beyond the creation – time is nothing.
To envisage this concept of no such thing as time and we are within the creation which is without time is the central form which has to be perceived. (In a later part I refer to time as it is used scientifically as a means of connection and measurement.)
To conceive of the theory there is a Big Bang is the culmination of an unravelling of the constituent parts of our existence.

It has become so evident that there existed a moment when we ‘came’ into being – except from what we know of ‘mankind’ that part of the fluidity was not there in the exact ‘creative’ Big Bang – our existence was determined because of it, in and out of the Big Bang. It is what we are.Creation
We will never have the capability of discovering the ‘creation’ of existence because we are within it. It exists as us and is the entirety of the universe seen and unseen for which there are to be no subtract ions or additions.
Our reasoning is to make discover what is and not to discover what will be.

The fluidity in the above paragraph is in reference to the form we take.

In this form It is as though we exist within the the two reflective faces of two mirrors each unseparated and each containing all the light.
Our universe being within those mirror faces melded and inexorably in the infinite moment continually rearranging in a time which is inconceivable.

Our own world is methodically based on lineage which casts back through exploration of a universe of billions upon billions of years in the formation.
It is our concept of time without any other instruction. No external, and that is all that we see, knowledge is transferred.
The sense of scale is ours through measurement alone. Even the nano level shows temporal differences around any measurement due to the fluidity of all that is in existence.

Our thoughts are conceived around firstly an understanding our own world and life within it. The conditions in which we exist and the powers of spiritual thinking adapt and provide the necessary formula for existence by our reliance on each other and on the regulation through ‘days’ of our lives.Gaia
Whether you call this the theory of no time or of our phenomena is not of any importance. We live in a time within ‘no time’ where we have despite the insignificance of it ‘invented’ seven days for a week by division of a ‘calendar’ found in the behaviour of the planet in relation to the sun and moon. It is a stretched time where we have seasons and the planet ‘Gaia’
as a model of the earth self-regulating organism is a closer recognition than the one which is adhered to that has seven days. A day is the same in Gaia as the next day and the day after that.

In other words there is no need for a day to have a name and seven of those days advance and the same days name arises. It is not logical but a mechanistic set of conformities which deny us true revelation.
The possible explanation is that we fear that uncertainty while seeking uncertainty through destructive and immoral behaviour.
That of war and that of up recognition of Gaia as a base elemental truth.Perceived
The cognitive pressures to learn and be able to create ‘everlasting’ conditions, the life after death hypothesis is but one as enlightenment and social realism which are forms of elucidation. Meaning is our questioning reasonings prevailing purpose.
We are the inhabitants in that moment of no time and within it we exist as the quantum parts of that creation.
To act on things we need some certainty and as constituent parts we evolve, are evolving within a frameless universe. The manifestations are a return to our earlier existence through the dissolution of this planet. The planet is a gathering of an immobile part of the universe.Finite
It may seem as an infinity but it is of no time and the infinity exists only as a creation within something that is already here but we know nothing of.
For Gaia we assume the ‘laws’ of Titan, that ancient Greek god of the sun, represented as driving a chariot across the heavens; identified by the Romans with Sol.Computed
There is a sweeping away of the many layers of our self deception and it is through the ‘advancement’ of theory which has collected and been revealing new things to us as our advance has led to new methods of learning, the patterns obtained through computing and the relevance of the anti-fragile world is pulling us into the centre of the Big Bang as it is key to our own understanding.

To not look for something new is a positive and it also defines for us a future which does not exist, only our cycle within the already existing is our life.Now
In the Pillowbook it is the idea that something exists that you knew all along.
The recognition and revalation is exhilarating and it is driving you closer to that ultimate knowledge of your own existence and of not just something but everything. It is as is now.Adam and Eve
Another aspect in the Pillowbook which drew me into this exploration, this examination of the thought it provoked is concerning the basis of all Religion. Love of one another above all else.
Primarily in putting the case for God as our proof is the greatest proof of all of our capacity to love in the beginning. From Adam and Eve, she explains in passage 203, –‘Dorna insists there is only one sin. And that is not loving someone enough to be perfect – that is to say, to obey them perfectly. Starting of course with your parent, or parents. Adam and Eve did love their single parent -as much as any uncomprehending child, in those first days of life, does love the Being that feeds and succoured it; but if you disobey that Being it is akin to not loving it and this – seeming not to love duly – is the strongest spring of guilt. This is the real Original Sin.

Gods case and the case for all parents, is that Creation itself is the greatest proof of love.’

Here Eleanor Bron, whose Jewish sensitivity to Religious thinking has enabled and brought her a very well honed and considered approach to discerning hinges in light of her accrued life’s experience, again touches on elements which although totally without proof of concept or realism are harbours of faith of God as creator. They are disproportionately valuable in their wisdom. It is also a probable cause of the authors ability to perform complex roles in virtue of her disposition for learning and drama as a means of delivering understanding. It is warming to realise this singularity of direction is but one of the vast number of directions peoples lives take them.

Knowing your limits of love is a failing in the perfection known through God.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Action at a Distance – Dice or No Dice

A History of Brief Time
In this time, several reflections can be made of advancements in science and by a small coincidence an exhibition opens this week in Belfast on the theories found by John Stewart Bell.
If a small explanation of his principle theorem is made it is this – Our world is non-local as sub atomic particles act on each other no matter how far apart. Regardless of relation in time or light.
Problematically it has of its relation to quantum theory one thing most evident.

The experiment of separation is achieved through fine distancing which in continuing the separation exacting care enables the exclusion of other forces. It is noted there is still elemental properties within a vacuum so for Jonathan Bell to create an experiment which removes all other elements apart from the sub-particles which ‘bind’ ‘repell’ is the outstanding advance which confirmed the theory for further proofs to emerge.Event
It is only probability and has no certainty. It is not a deterministic theory in which the future can be predicted. In the circumstances Einstein was philosophically correct in believing the ‘old reliable’ does not play dice.
In this he acknowledges the very eventful – the proximity to being determined through all available present knowledge – as being immense.

Only the absence of this proof is deepening the void and creating an unbridgeable divide between this and the light connection unseen.
The chromatic sciences of art and nature, seen in the film ‘Mr Turner’ as prismatic light obtained through diffusion in glass.
That light passing through air which itself dissipates its colour and scatters before us principally blue which is the light we walk through.

Think of each oxygen particle and four other nitrogen colourless particles which we read through and breath in. Our connection to each other is made through the links of us sharing the same air at some point in different particles of the same element.

It is as though we are linked not only by design, homologous parts are shared between species and our ability to compress and arrange air through our larynx is what makes us able to communicate in a higher order.

That is all that separates us from other species and principally the chimpanzee. It is a reality which environment has stimulated.

Out further is the construct of our finite world within the Big Bang.

Rearview Science
Standing not in front of us but behind us – no science is found in – ‘the future’ – is what is to be uncovered. Swept away by continual trial and error we can connect things as they indeed form their principle.

The dimension of connectivity is physical and JSB John Stewart Bells theorem is the belief not the certainty that each sub particle influences the behavior of another far distant sub particle – [of the same composition?]

In measurement theory there is a held condition needed to allow value to be determined. It is the observance of sub-sets of conditions as they differ minutely. In such small size of variability and in continual flux that they are made invisible to the measurement and for its use.

Science is the discovery of the past not the discovery of the future.

John Graham

4 November 2014

Belfast

The Four Quartets by T.S.Eliot contains this beginning passage.

Time present and time past
Are both perhaps present in time future
And time future contained in time past.
If all time is eternally present
All time is unredeemable.
What might have been is an abstraction Remaining a perpetual possibility
Only in a world of speculation.
What might have been and what has been
Point to one end, which is always present.
Footfalls echo in the memory
Down the passage which we did not take
Towards the door we never opened
Into the rose-garden. My words echo
Thus, in your mind.
But to what purpose
Disturbing the dust on a bowl of rose-leaves I do not know.